


Look On My Works, Ye Mighty, And Despair

by nic_takes_Ls (nic_L)



Series: Ozymandias || Banished Kings AU [2]
Category: DreamSMP, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: (near end), (they're always lurking), 2020 L'Manberg Election on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), A new world, Aftermath of Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, BAMF Niki | Nihachu, Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Friendships, Fantasy elements, Gen, Holding Hands, Hybrid Wilbur Soot, Light Angst, Minecraft Mechanics, Minecraft levels of Violence, Muteness, Niki POV, Niki | Nihachu-centric, Ram hybrid Schlatt, Speedrunning, The Nether (Minecraft), The Skygods, Wilbur Soot-centric, a song- of course, and finally, boyos bonding over lava, featuring:, like- a lot, mm regen pots, oh a niki gets to have fire ig too yea, quite a bit of - Freeform, the ban hammer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:28:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28283199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nic_L/pseuds/nic_takes_Ls
Summary: “And then- I exile Wilbur Soot- BANISH him from this land. Feet off of this territory. And well- you might want to find a portal, honestly. It’s only a little bit personal, Wilbur.”Schlatt almost sounds apologetic, then snaps his fingers and tilts his head, a gesture as casual as his ear flick.Wilbur's been banished. Alone. Then he runs into Dream and then only more trouble follows and the next thing they know, the pair of them are running on a time limit to escape to Server. It's only a little bit fucked. Okay, maybe quite a bit.With an all-star guest cast of:Masks, lava, portals, this one arrow that fucks everything up, lava, violent shade of green, communicators, and- oh! It's Niki's turn to go feral, and also lava.
Relationships: Dream & Wilbur Soot, Wilbur Soot & Jschlatt, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Series: Ozymandias || Banished Kings AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2030164
Comments: 24
Kudos: 161





	Look On My Works, Ye Mighty, And Despair

**Author's Note:**

> bro bro bro bro im so fucking hyped to finally get this out
> 
> me and mel have been working on this au for quite a while and hngngng this is only the first fic in the first arc before the main timeskip/shit goes down
> 
> hhhhhhhhhhHHHH

  
“We sold him for a crown, my boys, but I divven't tell you where-”  
  
  
A dull scuff of cobble makes Wilbur quit his strumming and look over the edge of the wall he now sat upon. His guitar digs into his arm where he’s hunched over it, but ignores it and blinks at the figure of Dream, similarly peering up at him and mask a dull sheen in the dying sunlight.  
  
  
They keep eyes locked, presumably at least, Wilbur’s flicking over the two painted dots on the pearlescent and off-white of the mask.  
  
  
Dream takes a step back, shoulders lax and arms empty. Sits on the grass far below Wilbur’s perch.  
  
  
Wilbur lets his lips curve in a gentle smile, feels his ears twitch where they’re hidden under his bicorne hat and begins picking through chords absent-mindedly.  
  
  
“Isn’t it hard, oh, isn’t it strange, to rule in a world which you can rearrange?” He sings the verse while his eyes are locked onto Dream, who’s now crossed his arms over his legs.  
  
  
“You are a mirror image, of a king you’ll never know, who fears the same thing as you.”  
  
  
Dream tilts his head, and over the breeze and gentle resonating of guitar strings, Wilbur can almost hear a faint hum.  
  
  
“There’s two of you, and yet you’re so alone, left without understanding your position as king.”  
  
  
A wind picks up a scatter of leaves into the air past Dream and tosses Wilbur’s own loose curls back into his face, catching in his lashes and nearly pushing off Wilbur’s hat.  
  
  
He lifts his hands from the worn familiar wood of his guitar and fixes his bangs, then grips onto the ledge he sits upon and leans down. Sings without a melody.  
  
  
“Understanding your position, as _king_ .”  
  
  
The last word is a hushed whisper.  
  
  
Dream is once again standing, and the two kings men seem locked in their silence, their shared set shoulders and Wilbur almost wants to remark on the masks they both wear, ~~o~~ ~~ne more visible than the other~~ the weight on their heads he knows Dream must feel, how Wilbur wants to scream and cry into his pillow every night and wonders how Dream chooses to cope.  
  
  
Dream steps close to the wall and Wilbur thinks he might lift his hand, and then he thinks that he’d reach down to clasp it.  
  
  
“Wilbur! What’re you looking at?”  
  
  
Tommy’s voice startles Wilbur and he sways, clutching to his guitar and turning his head from Dream.  
  
  
“You look like you’re about to fall.”  
  
  


Tommy is smirking and holds a stack of- Wilbur presumes Election paperwork, under his arm.  
  
  
“Well, I’m certain it _couldn’t_ be from the fact that you scared me. What’s this?”  
  
  
Tommy steps close to the wall and Wilbur whirls his head ‘round to look for Tommy’s reaction to Dream; He’s still bitter to the man, which Wilbur can’t blame.  
  
  
Dream’s gone, like a-  
  
  
Well.  
  
  
“Eh, just more documents or some shit. Other applicants, I think. Wanna head inside? It’s getting dark.”  
  
  
Wilbur slips from the ledge of the wall and slings his guitar over his back. Glances out over the land he protects, he’s won, he’s saved. A special place. 

Thinks on how he must fight again to keep it safe.  
  
  
He’s not going to let it ~~drown~~ , ๒ยгภ, become ₦Ø₮Ⱨł₦₲ and ė̦̣̱͆̇ͤ͢v̢̪͖̱̙͍͖̉̾̃ë̜͍̳͚̩́̃͌ͩ͜r̢̖̪̖̱̫͕ͧ͆y̮͙ͨ͜ṱ̸̳̖͕̪͇̥̳ͫ́h̢̹̳͔̣͖ͮ͆ͫǐ̤̺̫͖͉̜̠ͤ̿͐nͯ͏̟̯͇g̡͖̝̬͙͍͖̽̌̈́̚, ʂƙყ ιƚʂҽʅϝ, not this time.  
  
  
He pulls the invisible mask over his face once more, a genial smile frames his face nicely. Wilbur gets ready to fill out some paperwork.  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
Now Wilbur feels his heart thud between his ears. His fingers shake and he’s nearly stumbling down the stairs of the stage as the crowd hisses in whispers. He knows his eyes are wide, and keeps them lowered. Feels Tommy staring into his soul, imagines the stunned look on his face.

Heavy footsteps approach the mic as Wilbur ducks into the crowd beside Tommy, who’s turning from him to the stage repeatedly.

“We’ve lost?” His voice is weak, and it cracks in the center like a piece of glass.

Wilbur is just as dumbstruck as he is.

“Well. That was a lot easier that I thought it would be, huh?”

That American accent thick and ploying seeps into Wilbur’s ears, so familiar, so chilling now.

Wilbur tugs his hat to closer shadow his face and glances up. It’s a horrible sight to see.

Schlatt isn’t grinning, no lauding sneer, but a solemn mask with something feral about his expression, and the crowd sees it in his inhuman eyes. In his hybrid features.

Those long furred ears and knife-slot eyes.

The white fur over his body.

The laurel of horns, a halo on his head.  
  
  
He wears no mask.

“Uh, Wilbur- everyone. Do you know what I said, the day I got unbanned from the DreamSMP, and the day I said I was running... for an election that I have just won by the way?”

He splays his hand across the podium and leans into the mic, his pink tie swaying with the movement. It gives a small metallic sound of feedback ringing.

“No? Well, I said; ‘Things are gonna change’. I looked at every one of you- every citizen of L'Manberg in each of your eyes then and I said; "You’re all going to listen to me... this place will be a lot different tomorrow."”

Schlatt’s eyes flicker to the sky, and his face becomes unreadable and he says in such an offhand tone;

“I think I’m going to start making it happen. My first decree, as the president of L'Manberg-“

Wilbur feels shudders roll down his spine as Schlatt speaks softer now into the mic. His amber eyes are blazing into Wilbur from above and Wilbur tenses.

“Is to REVOKE the citizenship of Wilbur Soot, and TommyInnit!”

Gasps sound around the pair, Tommy makes a disbelieving noise, and Wilbur turns to ice.

His shoulders are squared, face emotionless, mask polished and painted on but Schlatt isn’t done.

“And then- I exile Wilbur Soot- BANISH him from this land. Feet off of this territory. And well- you might want to find a portal, honestly. It’s only a little bit personal, Wilbur.”

Schlatt almost sounds apologetic, then snaps his fingers and tilts his head, a gesture as casual as his ear flick.

The world seems to teeter beneath Wilbur’s feet as slowly but surely, Schlatt’s associates, the men he’d brought with him as he entered the server in their stiff black suits raise iron-tipped crossbows to his face.

There’s a noise that sounds distressingly like a hiss of TNT, Schlatt’s has known how much he’d hated that noise and the first arrow fires past his shoulder. Wilbur stumbles backwards, and he tears out of the crowd, Tommy his right hand man, his right hand man Tommy starting to give chase but pulled back by another man in a suit.

There’s a sudden rush of chaos as Schlatt’s Administration follow Wilbur’s path he starts twisting and weaving through the throes of citizens watching in shock. He nearly slams into an elderly man, dodges a woman and her child and narrowly avoids bowling over a boy hardly older than he wearing the same uniform.

Schlatt’s voice calls with a crackle in the mic.

“That means you too, militia. Take Wilbur out.”

The man’s eyes flicker from the stage and back to Wilbur again before he reluctantly reaches for a short sword in his pocket.

Wilbur’s gasp becomes a wheeze as one of the men he’d once directed now draws against him, and turns to the side of the city nearest the pine woods.

He darts through a line of unsure soldiers and past them all into the pine trees’ cool shade, and feels wind whip at his cheeks, wet with panic and tears.

Wilbur tears through the woods as footsteps chase him; a sword is slashed seconds away from his back, a chain swings to nearly clip his legs, and an arrow brushes the coattails of his uniform.

He feels his hat begin to slip off his head and a dull spike of fear runs through him but it’s already overwhelmed by the panic of death loping behind him. 

Then from the side of his eye he sees a rock jut out over a small dip in the terrain and races for it to make a leap, makes the mistake of turning his head to see behind him.

There are soldiers with weapons drawn and giving chase, men that Wilbur himself had given orders to, split his own rations with, charged into battle and led into war- 

And they’re aiming at him.

Wilbur prepares to jump off the overpassing rock and into the limbs of a leaning tree, but as he turns his head once more to check for attackers, and a _thwip_ whistles in his ears and stops with a dull sound. A spray of wet and red flickers over his cheeks and under his chin. 

He blinks a second, legs suddenly stilled and trembling and swaying. Wilbur tries to take a breath but it goes all wrong and he makes a strange choking noise. It’s odd. 

He reaches for his neck and fingers touch a damp feather shaft, he tugs a bit and his head blurs with pain, bolts of fire running down his spine and knees crumpling beneath him. 

Oh. There’s an arrow in his throat.

Wilbur touches the tip of his finger to his collarbone, rivulets of blood trickling down them and coating his hand. He tries to make a noise and the wound in his neck flares with such a deep ache, an ache not unlike the initial searing of magma over his back. 

He longs to go to sleep and sways with it. 

As footsteps approach and the navy blue of militia flicker through the trees, a shadow falls over Wilbur with a shatter like glass.

He turns his head, still crumpled on his knees and expressionless, and fragments of an ender pearl crushed under a boot are at his eye level. Wilbur’s lashes flutter closed and he slumps down further into himself.

“No- No, Wilbur- you can’t do this right now.” 

A voice nearly makes Wilbur’s eyelids lift but they’re much too heavy, and the last thing he feels is a pair of hands hauling him from his shoulders and after something brushes against the arrow lodged in his neck, a pain like a tidal wave swallows him under. 

* * *

  
  


There are fingers dancing nervously across Wilbur’s neck and shoulders, and he forces his eyes to roll open and comes face to face with a painted smiley face cloaked in a violent shade of green.

Wilbur attempts to make a noise in surprise and immediately regrets it, jagged spikes of fire in his throat forcing him to double over and a strangled breath the only sound.

“Stop, Wilbur. Let me pour the rest of this, okay?”

Wilbur’s awareness snaps to a peak as he registers Dream’s gloved hand holding a coral-tinted vial above him and the fact that last he remembered he had an arrow to the throat.

Dream makes a quiet shush and lowers the regeneration potion to Wilbur’s neck and pours it slowly over the open wound.

It stings and yet soothes, and Wilbur flinches, a trembling hand in the air and Dream catches it and tugs it down.

“I- I don’t think you’ll be able to talk for a while, alright? Just listen. Do you remember what’s happening? Don’t nod, just- one finger for yes and two for no.”  
  


Wilbur raises a sticky hand- red staining his palm and colouring his nails, and a single shaky finger. He remembers.

“Right. Uh, I’m going to take you to my place, alright? You’re-“

Dream leans over Wilbur’s neck as if taking a deeper look at his searing wound, and a tiny gasp is elicited from his throat.

Wilbur’s fucked. Fucked up somehow, he knows from the reaction.

“You’re gonna be fine.” Dream lies. “I’m pulling you up now, okay?”

Wilbur lifts his finger once again and clutches at Dream’s hands as he’s filled from his position on his back. His neck stings and his breathing falters, but he pushes to his feet.

They’re much deeper in the woods this time, nothing recognizable around, not signs or manmade anything. But the sun is setting on one side and a patch of moss points another, so Wilbur can at least point out which direction they came from.

Dream is still holding Wilbur’s forearms tight and steady, and Wilbur doesn’t bother to break free.

He does, however, give a questioning glance, as much as he is able in the fading light and the grimace certainly painted on his face.

Dream’s weathered mask does not show any emotion and yet the shift of his shoulders imply he knows what Wilbur wants to say.

“I used a few pearls to get us out of there. You scared me, honestly. I’d almost thought you were gone for a second back there.”

The potion coursing through Wilbur’s veins almost gives him a buzz, more of a blur to the pain than a deterrent.

He gently reaches one hand up to his face, though moving his shoulder radiates all the way to his neck. Scrubbing his hand through his hair, he realizes his hat must’ve fallen off and his stomach twists before he consoles himself with the reminder that he hasn’t cut his hair in a while, at least, and it’s wild enough to hide-

Those.

Dream taps a gloved finger against the arm he’s holding steady and face hidden, speaks.

“I have stronger potions at my little stash out here, okay, Wilbur? I’ve got a good amount of these but if you want to actually get better then we should hurry.”  
  
  
Wilbur almost moves to nod, but a single shift and a shock runs down his spine and he lifts a finger in agreement. The hand is covered in dried, flaming blood and as he blinks at it and then the soaked front of his prized coat and shirt, notices how much he must’ve bled.

His eyes trace Dream’s clothing and there is a stain of red, smudged crimson on dragged fingertips over the edge of his mask.

Wilbur’s never been the biggest fan of red.

Dream begins to start walking, slow and every path chosen to bear the least impact when walking, Wilbur walking alongside with a grit of teeth and breath hitch in every step.

The forest floor is a blur in Wilbur’s eyes, too unfocused and dizzy with pain to take in his surroundings. But Dream leads him, tugs Wilbur’s arm around his own neck and eventually, Dream calls Wilbur’s name and pauses.

Wilbur blinks from his daze and up from the fallen pine needles and cones under his boots.

There’s a clearing, a small lean-to against a wide trunk of a pine, campfire unlit and a wall of furnaces with cold coal still inside.

“Come sit in here.” Dream takes Wilbur to the lean-to and eases him down.

Wilbur makes a quickly aborted mission of trying to make a reply, ~~throat searing in a way that melds with the healing potion, burning and cauterized and-~~ and grabs his own shoulders and watches. Dream pulls open a barrel half-sunk in the ground and pulls out a rosy-hued vial. Regeneration.

The masked man turns to Wilbur and then back to the barrel and grabs out another two bottles.

By the time Dream’s poured the potions over his neck, it’s numb and Wilbur’s breathing is slightly easier, but his fingers tremble and there’s still panic and adrenaline pulsing under his skin. 

  
Dream finally leans back and wipes his hands on a rag set aside, the stray locks of hair visible from his mask and hood dark with sweat, even in the bitter-cold of the night.  
  
  
“I’m- I’m sorry, that’s all I can give you for the moment.”  
  
  
Wilbur huffs weakly and lifts his hand, which falters in midair until he attempts to make a scrawling motion.  
  
  
Dream makes a noise of recognition and begins patting his satchel before pulling out a book and quill.  
  
  
“Yeah, yeah, you can write things out.”  
  
  
Wilbur lets the leather book touch his fingertips, dried blood coating them and making a faint stain as he brushes them across the pages. He flicks the feather-tipped pen in a familiar motion, but upon going to write, he pauses.  
  
  
His eyes flit up to Dream’s mask, and he hates how he can’t read a face, there are no eyes to watch shift away or flick up, no mouth to watch the corners of unsaid words, not even a picture to imagine to his words. He scrawls in an unsteady hand;  
  
  
_Why are you helping me?_  
  
  
Dream leans over to see the words and sighs immediately after, as if it’s obvious.  
  
  
“Wilbur, you know I don’t want you dead. We’re- Good, now, and I- I don’t think I want Schlatt in charge anyways. I was fine with you. We were friends, right? Tentatively, at least. So- Don’t even bother with that question.”  
  
  
Wilbur lets his shoulders drop under Dream’s hand and the thin strand of paranoia that Dream was going to bite him in the back snaps.  
  
  
“I’m gonna- I’m going to keep you safe, alright?” Dream squeezes Wilbur’s shoulder and Wilbur makes a slow, unsteady nod.  
  
  
Wilbur attempts to sit up and Dream pulls him up by his hands, lets him steady his position. The paper and quill are retrieved from under Wilbur’s arm and he’s nearly touched his pen to paper, ready to question what he could possibly do next, until a buzz goes off from both Dream’s and Wilbur’s pockets.

Dream pulls out his own communicator and then nearly drops the device.

“Wilbur-“

The other man’ voice is choked, horrified, and Wilbur slides his communicator from his pocket, reads the latest notification.

_WilburSoot has been banned from the world._

Oh. That’s why Schlatt had suggested finding a portal. He was going to die in less than 6 hours.  
  
  
“ _Wilbur_ \- I- _Fuck_ , how the hell did Schlatt- _What?_ ” Dream jumps to his feet and brings his hands to his head, the loose strands of his hair pulled between his fingers. The moonlight ripples across the sword sheathed at his waist, the dagger handle visible from where it’s slipped into his boot.  
  
  
“I’m the Admin, how in Ender’s name did he-”  
  
  
Dream’s shoulders are rising, hackles raised and fear nearly thick enough in the air to scent, and Wilbur, though his mind is both numb and blurring with his own panic, reaches out and seizes Dream’s ankle. Dream whirls arounds and drops to his knees, grabs Wilbur’s shoulder. His body language changes instantly from tense to concerned.  
  
  
“Wilbur- Are you alright? What- What- Besides the _obvious_ , ~~(a deliriously unhappy laugh leaps from Dream’s lips as he says it)~~ what?”  
  
  
Wilbur slides the pen on the floor with his boot from where it had fallen to his hand, and writes carefully, slowly, through potion-addled muscles’ wailing and his breaths rattling in his torn throat.  
  
  
_Are there any Server portals in the Nether?_ _  
  
_  
“Any more-” Dream makes a short gasp. “Because it’s so close to L’Manberg. We’d have to practically go through it. _Fuck_ .”  
  
  
Wilbur nods, albeit ever so tenderly and hardly noticeable.  
  
  
Dream turns his masked face to the side and seems to hesitate. The strap of his mask is white, not the previously assumed brown of tanned leather Wilbur had always unconsciously pictured.  
  
  
“Wilbur- I- There aren’t any other Server portals in the Nether.”  
  
  
Wilbur feels his stomach drop out to his feet and the breath in his lungs gush out like a breeze, strangled and cold.  
  
  
It’s as if Dream’s realized the implications of his words as he shifts forwards on his knees and speaks.  
  
  
“But- Wilbur-” Dream grabs one too-pale hand in his own. “No- Don’t- I mean, I have a Nexus, okay? And- And there’s a start of a Server portal out in the Nether, we just have to finish it. I’m going to help you.”  
  
  
Wilbur looks up from where he’d been staring stock-still at the glitter of Dream’s armour in moonlight, but meets the painted eyes of the mask.  
  
  
“I’m not going to let you die.”  
  
  
Wilbur hears the rush of a heavy wind outside. But he’s inside the thin, leather hide walls and his back is against the trunk of a pine tree and the wind cannot touch him from here. He’s not sure if that is a good thing or bad.  
  
  
He lets his hand settle more firmly in Dream’s, fingers intertwine and Wilbur remembers that one fading sunset where he sat on a wall and sang and nearly clasped Dream’s hand in his own.  
  
  
Dream pulls Wilbur up to his feet and lets Wilbur steady himself outside the lean-to as he gathers items from his chests, fills an empty bag and slings it over his own shoulder.  
  
  
The pine needles under Wilbur’s feet rustle and Wilbur shifts his weight, awkwardly silent when he’d usually be talking. He takes off his now crimson-stained coat and ties it around his waist, the white undershirt underneath and ruffled collar still wet and stiff with blood.  
  
  
“There’s a Nether portal a ways from here that we might be able to reach by morning, I think.”  
  
  
Dream slings a medic store’s amount of potions, all glittering a tell-tale hue of pink and regeneration, into his satchel strapped across his back and aims a kick at one of the poles of the lean-to. It crumples flat and Dream kicks pine needles over it until it was never there.  
  
  
Wilbur blinks, and if his throat were working at the moment he would’ve asked a million questions, but he can’t, and Dream takes his wrist in hand and tugs him into the woods, even farther than his home, his country he had built.  
  
  
Wilbur sways ever so slightly as he pictures Tommy’s, Tubbo’s, everyone’s faces, and then he stops thinking and walks with Dream mindlessly. He’s watching his breathe gradually form more and more solidly into fog as the air around them cools, nearly expecting the first flake of snow of the season, when the communicator in his pocket vibrates.  
  
  
Dream’s has too, and there’s a thread of dread around them both. Dream moves his hand to reach into his own pocket first, but Wilbur yanks out the machine and taps the screen until it glows, lighting up his face and washing his face pale.  
  
  
He reads the words, and it’s like an icy claw has scraped its way down his spine and slotted against every bone. His hand unwillingly drops the communicator, but it lands face-up in the floor of pine needles and frozen ground.  
  
  
Dream follows it with his gaze. The hand around Wilbur’s wrist spasms and clenches tight.

  
_Dream has been banned from the world._  
  
  
The first snowflake of winter lands on Wilbur’s wrist. It melts.  
  


* * *

  
The snow ends up hardly hindering the pairs’ journey through the expanse of pine trees, merely catching in Wilbur’s eyelashes and giving the ground a light dusting of white, turning brown as it melds with the mud. Occasionally one stumbles, but they cling together so tight, Dream’s arm flush around Wilbur’s shoulder and fingers around his wrist white and nearly bloodless from the grip, that they do not fall.  
  
  
As night sinks deeper into the ground and the skies and the growing ice over the damp, the monsters rise as well.  
  
  
Wilbur is weaponless and in too much of a potion-blurred addle to fight anyways, so when a zombie claws its way from around a tree, Dream takes his arm from Wilbur’s neck and impales an arrow into its head.  
  
  
Wilbur flinches.  
  
  
Dream makes sure to switch to his axe to handle the next three.  
  
  
As Dream fights off a pair of spiders that had leapt from the maw of a nearby cave, Wilbur stays back and watches the way he evades each attack, tracks the smooth swing of the axe over the spiders’ abdomens. 

He’d envied Dream’s effortless abilities to fight and run like the wind was always at his back during their war, and before the election had attempted to improve his own offensive skills, but swords always felt off-balance in his hands and shields too slow to rise before a blade struck.  
  
  
Eventually the pines disappear from the landscape entirely and the lush green of a forest biome fades into the grass underfoot. Wilbur is led by Dream’s unspoken trail, silence between them safe and warm when the winds blow bitter over Wilbur’s arms. Their path takes them between oak trees and mossy grounds to a small ditch, and Wilbur sees it.  
  
  
A frame of glassy black mineral, deep and a sheen like ink, woven from rock and in a tall oval shape. The obsidian is unlit.  
  
  
A Nether portal.  
  
  
Dream removes his arm from around Wilbur’s neck and crouches low to it, looks back through his mask that is pale in the light of the moon at Wilbur’s face. A flicker of flint on steel, a click and then a spark makes its way around the inner surface of the obsidian. The frame is filled with a purple surface of fire.  
  
  
Wilbur’s stomach drops and the strange atmosphere of the Nether is already making his head blur in time with his heartbeat, his fingers warm and he takes a stuttering step back.  
  
  
Dream’s stood up and put his lighter away, but at the almost inaudible whimper from Wilbur, whirls around with axe in hand, likely expecting a mob.  
  
  
Fingers curl and his nails bite his own palm, Wilbur feels a lump in the back of his throat rise and chokes, the still-wet wound on his neck registers in his mind as he panics. He sinks to his knees slowly and shakes his head. Tears bubble to his eyes.

Suddenly, there's a gentle hand on his shoulder, another on his arm.

"Wilbur- What's wrong? I- Do you need more potions? We- I can give you more once we get to the Nether, we need to hurry though."

Wilbur opens his wet eyes and through the distortion of his tears, sees Dream's shaking hands, his own unsteady legs and the terror still running through his veins in his figure.

Dream's grip squeezes for a second and then is normal once more.

"It is- The portal? Have you not been to the Nether before?"

Wilbur has. But he nods and Dream pauses before pulling Wilbur up to his feet by the shoulders.

"That's okay. The path from here to the Server portal isn't very long, I promise. Most of it is a tunnel through a netherrack wall, and I have gold to distract Piglins with."

The mention of Piglins causes Wilbur's ears to twitch under his mess of curls and his muscles to tense, but he knows that there's no other way to live than through the Nether.

Dream said he wouldn't leave without Wilbur, and Wilbur won't let Dream die.

So he stands and eyes closed, he follows Dream’s lead into the swirling abyss of fushia and fires and feeling as though his skin wants to slough off. 

  
The heat is easily the first thing he notices. The strange prickling under his skin is the second.  
  
  
“Wilbur- We’re okay, alright? We’re in a closed tunnel, there’s no mobs or fire.”  
  
  
Dream’s voice is oddly soothing and Wilbur grips his hand tight before blinking open into a vision of a red-hued stone tunnel, long and looming.  
  
  
Wilbur’s ears feel close to popping and the disorientation makes him stumble from the ledge of obsidian. There’s no lights around but the world is still much brighter than it should be. Shadows don’t play along the rules here, it seems.  
  
  
As he takes a cautious step away from the portal (away, even further from his _home_ ) Wilbur takes careful note of his limbs, and then is acutely aware of the weight of his communicator on his wrist. He tugs his hand from Dream’s and turns it on, reading the message that was sent-  
  
  
By now, 4 hours ago.  
  
  
He and Dream have two hours left in DreamSMP.  
  
  
Wilbur taps Dream’s arm to get his attention and shows the damning number.  
  
  
The masked man makes a soft hitch in his breath and pulls on his satchel’s strap with a shallowly trembling hand.  
  
  
“Are- Are we good to go, Wilbur?”  
  
  
Wilbur raises one finger, the closest thing he has to a word, to a ‘yes’, and then they journey on.  
  
  
Neither of them can afford to think about the future of their existence now, of their homes and what will happen to their friends and their own two fate’s strings. Instead, they let quiet and the sounds of their footsteps and breathing and occasional scream of a faraway ghast spread like a salve in the tunnel they walk.  
  
  
There’s a small break that the pair of exiled kings take, sliding their backs down the wall and Dream pouring another potion of health over Wilbur’s neck where it’s dripping down his shirt, now stained in both red and pink. 

  
Dream pours water over a rag he’s packed and tries to gingerly clean around the fresh wound of his neck, but Wilbur makes a strangled cry as he even tries, and lets Wilbur wipe his face off instead. Dream inhales as he does.  
  
  
Wilbur drops the already nearly-dried cloth onto the ground and blinks at Dream in concern, and Dream gestures to where his own eyes would be if he weren’t wearing a mask.  
  
  
“Wilbur- You’re getting- Ban Marks.” He says, oh so hushed, and Wilbur shudders in revulsion. He brings his hands to his cheeks and his nails scrape gently at his skin.  
  
  
Dream tugs his hands from his face and grabs the handle of his axe from his side, and through the dingy reflection of the battle-worn weapon Wilbur can see the grey, slowly darkening marking under his eyes that resemble the tracks of tears marks.  
  
  
He gasps and it catches in his wounded throat, but quickly shoves Dream’s axe away and shifts to his knees.  
  
  
Dream watches as Wilbur slowly, weakly forces himself to his feet and then follows suit.  
  
  
“Right. Time limit.” He says, and does not acknowledge the fact that under his eyes must be the same lines, though both know with sunken hearts.  
  
  
The rest of the pathway through the tunnels is less silent, more sounds of Netherian mobs echoing down their hall and once, the grumbles of a Piglin near a thin area of the wall.  
  
  
At one point, Wilbur can make out the tell-tale brighter light of a torch on the wall, and Dream halts as he does.  
  
  
“Wilbur, a few feet after that torch, the tunnel opens up to a warped forest, alright? And- And the unfinished portal should be a few minutes away. I have more than enough obsidian to finish it and a Nexus right here.”  
  
  
With the words, Dream holds out the familiar glittering orb of tantalizing inky black, the Dragon Egg-manufactured object so rare that most people have never seen one in a photo.

Wilbur's had one of his own.

  
He lifts his hand in a ‘yes’ and they approach the visible end of the tunnel. The hall opens and Wilbur can see an expanse of blue-green not-quite-grass growing over the netherrack and spilling from trunks in foliage over a sea of pure lava, boiling and spitting and laving at the sides of the cliffs.  
  
  
Dream waves to get Wilbur’s attention and they follow an invisible path marked by gashes in the- Trees? Mushrooms? Wilbur isn’t sure.  
  
  
Dream bridges over a stream of running lava that pours from the ceiling of the Nether, and holds his hand out in expectation to Wilbur.  
  
  
He hesitates, the radiating heat below keeping his legs locked, but taking Dream’s hand is almost instinctive now, over these past 6 hours, so he reaches and is grasped and fingers lock and the masked leads the mute.  
  
  
No mobs come to harm them, somehow, of all the luck, and soon enough Dream makes a sound of recognition, a hitch in his breath, and there in the distance, down below the cliffs they stand over and across the sea of fire is a black frame that Wilbur can see glitter from here from its red beach.  
  
  
Then his eyes travel back across the expanse of literal lava and the drop they stand over, and he winces.  
  
  
“What?” Dream asks as Wilbur taps the back of his gloved hand with a finger. “The lava? Wait- I know,” And he, bafflingly, makes a small rowboat from his stored oak wood, oblivious to Wilbur’s twitching hands as he stands behind the crouched man.  
  
  
Dream pushes the boat near the edge of the cliff, and Wilbur strains his throbbing throat to make half a whimper.  
  
  
“Get in.” Dream says, like a madman.  
  
  
Wilbur shakes his head obstinately, eyes wide and face pale.  
  
  
Dream is silent, before spluttering out a mess of a sentence and then starting over.  
  
  
“I- I used to speedrun. It’ll work.”  
  
  
Wilbur falters. Speedrunning is the notoriously illegal activity of opening New Worlds only to journey to the End and kill a Dragon to harvest and sell Dragon Eggs. If- If Dream were ever successful, then he had to know how to get around the Nether.

Another outstretched hand, and Wilbur doesn’t hesitate in taking it, sitting in the rowboat behind Dream and questioning to himself if he were about to die. It was only a matter of time anyways, so he doesn’t scrabble out the side as Dream edges them closer to falling.

At the last second, Wilbur notices Dream’s usual green cloak balled in his hand and makes a soundless groan, realizing his plan just as they tip over the brink. Dream’s cloak, ends held tight in each of his hands, billows and catches air, slowing their quick descent into a glide, almost, and they pass over the lava expanse seamlessly.

Wilbur leans ever so slightly to one side and gasps as the burning ocean glows and passes by. His ears flick from their cover of hair, and he turns to watch Dream’s shoulders shake as he laughs gleefully, airlessly, wheezing for air. Wilbur, despite himself and the circumstances, feels a pull at the edge of his lips too, and a single huff of air that could once be a laugh escapes his mouth.

Wilbur’s peering up at the glowstone-decorated roof and behind at the warped forest they’re leaving behind before facing front again, and then he blinks and shakes Dream’s shoulder wildly.

“Huh?” Dream turns his masked face, tinted orange in the ambient light, before Wilbur points out their descent too short to make onto land. “Fuck! Uh- Quick, just- Stand up and jump off the floorboards!”  
  


Wilbur takes Dream’s gloved wrist in hand, an instinctive move ever since these last hours, and together, they kick off the floorboards of the boat, pushing it into the lava and launching themselves just enough to hit the netherrack beach, lava leaping at their heels. Wilbur’s landed on his forearms and knees, and after gasping out painful, shallow, breaths, he sits up to find Dream kneeling before him. 

Wilbur looks back at their near-demise, the last bit of prow already sinking below the magma and Dream’s acid green cloak he had never been seen without fluttering down to meet the fiery sea.

The pair leave them both behind, approach the unfinished crystalline portal frame, refracting and absorbing the light of the fires around it. Wilbur pauses when Dream does, and watches the other pull out his flint and steel and the Nexus orb. Dream then shoves both into Wilbur’s empty hands and begins aligning his own obsidian with the rest of the portal, and when the shape is complete, Wilbur can feel it in warm shudders down his skin.

Dream is silent but holds out a hand, and Wilbur passes the Nexus orb gingerly. Dream places it perfectly center in the frame, glass tinkling against the mineral.

Wilbur takes his coat from around his waist before kneeling on it and striking the flint and steel, touching it to the wall of the portal and watching as the mystical, violent purple, a sheet of fire swirls around the edges and nearly touches the Nexus. Wilbur’s breath hitches as he waits for the portal to flare and then Dream shouts and there’s a crash of glass and a roaring heat over his head.

The screech of a ghast is heard and Wilbur processes, quickly, terribly, what has just happened.

“Oh, fuck.” Dream gasps as Wilbur sits up from his splayed position on the floor.

He looks up and his mouth drops as he takes in the sight; The frame is intact, but the Nexus has shattered into fragments of nearly ink-stained glass, broken and ruined and-

Wilbur hears the _whoosh_ of another flame building and darts his eyes up and down and grabs Dream’s hand, knocking the communicator from his wrist and yanks him into the frame. He strikes a match against the side of the portal, hands trembling, and as Dream realizes what’s happened, a violet light swirls and tickles against Wilbur’s skin and a fireball comes straight towards them with a screech.

The sound cuts out silently.

Wilbur is crouched on his knees, heaving. There is a different warmth battering on his skin and the ground is cool under his bloodied palms. He opens his eyes and sees grass, and flowers of yellow and blue and red.

He sobs, and clenches his hand in Dream’s.

The two ex-kings sit on the grass, just for a bit.

After all, they need to start moving; They’re all alone in a New World.

  
  
  
  


Niki is still hollow, reeling, empty and yet dark and roaring inside when a pair of suit-wearing fucks recently introduced as the Schlatt Association approach the podium, where much of the crowd has cleared and where Schlatt himself is talking to Tommy, who’s being held by the shoulders by Quackity.

They really don’t need to hold Tommy captive, he’s lost his will to fight. Niki can see it in the dark of his eyes from here.

She herself has not moved from where she had stood nearly an hour ago, awaited Pog2020’s win and quietly wished for her own party’s victory. Where she had watched Schlatt win instead. Where Schlatt had placed a Command Block, a machine to change anyone’s fate, and cast out her friend. Cast out the Admin.

There’s one more Command Schlatt can run, and Niki knows that whatever it is, it’s entered and ready to go at the flick of Schlatt’s fingers, and she has no idea what that man is capable of. Much more than she had thought originally.

But the new duo of Schlatt Adminitration members climb the stairs and interrupt the monster of a man, that horror-crowned hybrid from whatever he has just said to make Tommy’s face pale like that, and she can watch the ram hybrid whirl around, face blank.

Niki feels an ember spark deep in her gut and approaches the stage from the side, crouches low by the wall and holds her breath. From this far down she can hear voices, and her heart skips a beat.

“What do you mean, you chased them into the woods?” Schlatt’s voice is low, dangerous, worse than even his yelling had been into the mic.

“We had our men and the militia run Soot off into those pine woods, and then Dream appeared and took him further that way. We have a guard force still patrolling to make sure they don’t come back.”

There is a clearly uneasy silence.

“You- You were supposed to capture them. Bring them here. You were supposed to force them through the Server portal.” The voice is animalistic, a growl, dark and dangerous and all the things Niki feels inside her right now. “They weren’t supposed to d-”

Niki hears the faint thud of hooves upon the hardwood and Schlatt shouts louder now.

“Who can I get to track down W- Soot and Dream’s tracks?”

He asks, and the only responding voice is one Niki wishes she didn’t have to hear.

“I- Let me find them.” It’s Tubbo, voice dead and flat.

“Fine.”

Niki hears her own breath stutter over the sounds of Tubbo leaving the stage, footsteps racing down stairs.

“Now piss off. And- I’m going to have a talk with you two and the rest of the SA.” Schlatt hisses, and Niki assumes she’s talking to the suited pair and that SA stands for Schlatt Administration.

The pair descend down Niki’s side of the stairs and she curses before running away from the scene, diving into the streets that should’ve been filled with joy but are now full of whisperers, of paranoia, of questions and queries and a vast lack of answers. She feels herself burn.

She’s back at her house and she’s packed all her things, ready to look for Wilbur and Dream herself, when her communicator buzzes.

That buzzing makes her flinch. The last two times it’s happened is when there were two bannings, after all.

She switches it one and blinks as there’s a steady flow of messages, of alerts with different names and the same text. She sees her own name.

_“Nihachu has been Whitelisted.”_

She blinks.

Her name is already gone, drowned out in the log by tens of others.

She drops her bag and slumps in her chair, runs a hand through her mussed ponytail.

Whitelisting- Whitelisting was only a theory. One that claimed it was the opposite of Blacklisting, of banning; Being permanently stuck in a World.

She chokes on a sob rising in her throat, and turns to unpack her bags.

Ten minutes later, there’s news of the Server portal flickering out when a Whitelisted person tries to go through.

An hour later there’s a report on how Schlatt’s Command Block had corrupted before his and the witnesses still on stage’s eyes.

Three days later Niki’s started her first small rally. She’d yelled atop the podium at a meeting of the same militia Wilbur had fought for, and who had chased him, and she’d hissed and she’d screamed and she’d become a fire, burning brave and burning true and burning bright.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> You're laughing. i wrote in the flying boat speedrunning trick as a plot device and you're laughing.
> 
> go ahead PLEASSSE YELL AT ME IN THE COMMENTS its so rad lmao
> 
> ALSO :
> 
> join the writer's block discord server!!! We're all both chill and rather chaotic and you don't have to be a fic writer to join, you can just vibe and get to read snippets of wip fics or be a beta reader or even join our server SMP?? hmm???? just be a chaos entity??? 
> 
> https://discord.gg/w9CwSK26mm


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